Anti-Trump activists are handing out these very convincing — and very fake — Washington Posts around D.C.
The definition of fake news has hit Washington, D.C.
"UNPRESIDENTED," the front page of The Washington Post screamed Wednesday, featuring a story that claimed President Trump had resigned. Except it wasn't The Washington Post, and it definitely didn't happen.
An activist group spent Wednesday morning handing out the fake Post copies around the capital, dated May 1, 2019 and suggesting Trump would resign with a note written on a napkin, the real Washington Post reports. It was full of anti-Trump stories that also appeared on a Post lookalike website, which has since been taken down.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The Post's PR team quickly tweeted that the paper and website were "not Post products." Anti-Trump activist L.A. Kauffman later said she, along with author Onnesha Roychoudhuri and the activist pranksters known as the Yes Men, created the fake paper, per NPR. As Politico report Ian Kullgren tweeted, "this is problematic" and definitely not helping their cause, but whoever was handing out the papers "wasn't having it" when he told her as much, he said.
The now-defunct fake Post website contained just a story called "A look at the 64 bills." The real Post published a real version of it, which you can read here.
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Kathryn is a graduate of Syracuse University, with degrees in magazine journalism and information technology, along with hours to earn another degree after working at SU's independent paper The Daily Orange. She's currently recovering from a horse addiction while living in New York City, and likes to share her extremely dry sense of humor on Twitter.
-
A ‘golden age’ of nuclear powerThe Explainer The government is promising to ‘fire up nuclear power’. Why, and how?
-
Massacre in Darfur: the world looked the other wayTalking Point Atrocities in El Fasher follow decades of repression of Sudan’s black African population
-
Trump’s trade war: has China won?Talking Point US president wanted to punish Beijing, but the Asian superpower now holds the whip hand
-
Has Zohran Mamdani shown the Democrats how to win again?Today’s Big Question New York City mayoral election touted as victory for left-wing populists but moderate centrist wins elsewhere present more complex path for Democratic Party
-
Senate votes to kill Trump’s Brazil tariffSpeed Read Five Senate Republicans joined the Democrats in rebuking Trump’s import tax
-
Border Patrol gets scrutiny in court, gains power in ICESpeed Read Half of the new ICE directors are reportedly from DHS’s more aggressive Customs and Border Protection branch
-
Shutdown stalemate nears key pain pointsSpeed Read A federal employee union called for the Democrats to to stand down four weeks into the government standoff
-
Trump vows new tariffs on Canada over Reagan adspeed read The ad that offended the president has Ronald Reagan explaining why import taxes hurt the economy
-
NY attorney general asks public for ICE raid footageSpeed Read Rep. Dan Goldman claims ICE wrongly detained four US citizens in the Canal Street raid and held them for a whole day without charges
-
Trump’s huge ballroom to replace razed East WingSpeed Read The White House’s east wing is being torn down amid ballroom construction
-
Trump expands boat strikes to Pacific, killing 5 moreSpeed Read The US military destroyed two more alleged drug smuggling boats in international waters
